Posts Tagged ‘Software’

Some of you may remember a little company called Bungie that, back in the day, made cool games for the Mac like Marathon and Myth. As time went on they sold themselves to Microsoft and their Mac games kinda went away in favor of new games for the XBox and other consoles.

You may have heard of one of the games they created for the XBox during that time. It’s called Halo.

Anyway, in 2007 Bungie split from Microsoft and went on its own again. Since then they’ve made some new games and are now set to launch a brand new title we think looks pretty cool: Destiny.

There’s a new trailer for the game. Check it out after the break. Welcome back Bungie.

That whole “getting back on track” thing we were harping about a couple weeks ago? Yeah, that didn’t work out so well. We’re trying, believe us.

But sometimes, things don’t work out as planned. Until, of course, they do. That’s right, here’s a brand new episode of The Flickcast for your listening pleasure.

As usual, this week Chris and Joe take on some new topics and some old ones. Some of these include new trailers for The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, X-Men: Days of Future Past, more casting news from the world of movies and TV, The Walking Dead finale, the awesomeness of Magnum, P.I. and a whole lot more.

Just listen. You’ll enjoy it.

This week’s picks include Chris’ pick of the HBO series Game of Thrones and Joe’s pick of the bittorrent software BitTorrent Sync for Mac, PC, iOS and Android.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship, or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook, Google+ or via email.

In case you haven’t heard, Apple released an update to its mobile operating system this week. The update, known as iOS 7.1 to those in the know (and pretty much everyone else) features a host of improvements and bug fixes. But much like most of Apple’s updates, the company doesn’t really spell out exactly what all those “improvements and bug fixes” are.

But what if you really want to know each and every detail of this update? Fortunately, the folks at iTwe4kz have got you covered.

In fact, they’ve made a handy video that highlights pretty much everything that’s new in iOS 7.1. Cool, right?

Check out the video after the break. You can download Apple’s iOS 7.1 via software update on your devices or via iTunes.

Believe it or not, the actors in a movie or TV program don’t just make up their dialog on the spot (well, sometimes). Nor do the director or producers just make up the story as they go along (well, not very often).

In most cases, a person (or more than one) has to write a screenplay so the rest of the team can get together and make something. That person is called a writer. And most writers in Hollywood use a program called Final Draft to work their magic.

And now the makers of Final Draft have released a new version, Final Draft 9, and it’s got over 30 new and improved features to help writers (and the rest of the team) take care of the business of show.

Here’s some of them:

• New look and feel for both Mac and Windows users
• Navigator feature now offers story development tools for Scenes, ScriptNotes, and Characters
• Watermarks for PDFs and printing
• Improved Spell Checkers
• Mac specific features like retina display compatibility, dictation support and full screen mode

This will be a welcome announcement for the thousands (or more) of you using an Apple TV. HBO Go and Watch ESPN are now available via that device.

“HBO GO and WatchESPN are some of the most popular iOS apps and are sure to be huge hits on Apple TV,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services. “We continue to offer Apple TV users great new programming options, combined with access to all of the incredible content they can purchase from the iTunes Store.”

In case you didn’t know: HBO GO users get unlimited access to their favorite HBO shows, including HBO original programming, hit movies, sports, documentaries, comedy specials and more. This includes full seasons of the best of HBO, plus bonus features and special behind-the-scenes extras. HBO GO on Apple TV requires a subscription to HBO through participating television providers.

Here’s all the technical details too, just in case: Apple TV requires iTunes 10.5 or later. Apple TV requires an 802.11g/n Wi-Fi network or Ethernet network, a broadband Internet connection and a HD TV capable of 1080p or 720p and an HDMI cable that is sold separately. Third generation Apple TV hardware is required to play 1080p video. HBO GO, Watch ESPN, SkyNews, Crunchyroll and Qello require Apple TV software version 5.3 available as a free software update for second and third generation Apple TV users.

Truth be told, this is great news. We love our Apple TV and now we don’t have to fire up the XBox 360 or PS3 just to watch repeats of Game of Thrones. Thanks Apple.

People seem rather divided over the look of Apple’s new iOS 7. But love it or hate it, iOS 7 is here to stay. That’s great for iPhone and iPad users excited for the new OS, but what about people using Android smartphones?

Fortunately, Android users who do want the iOS 7 experience are in luck because an intrepid Android developer has decided to copy it and create a theme for Android called “jbOS 7.” The theme, who’s full name is “Jelly Bean OS 7,” is compatible with handsets running Android 4.0 and later.

Once installed, the theme mimics the look and feel of many aspects of the iOS 7 interface including the lock screen, home screens, some apps and the new app icons. The photo above gives you an idea of how that looks.

There’s also a handy video as well, which we’ve included after the break. For more on “jbOS 7” or to get the files needed to install the theme, head on over to the developer’s website.

In truth, we’re not entirely sure why someone using Android would want to do this, but heck, who are we to judge? People do love to modify their Android devices. Maybe the iOS 7 theme will actually catch on?

It might be cold in here because Hell may have frozen over. That’s right, Microsoft Office for iOS has finally arrived. Sort of.

The “Redmond Giant” has released Office Mobile for Office 365 subscribers. The app is a free download, at the moment, but an Office 365 subscription is required for use. Lame.

Couple things that struck us off the bat with this: The app is currently available only for the iPhone. Double lame. Who uses an iPhone for this kind of thing? That’s what iPads were made for.

Second, you can only save documents to your Sky Drive account. No local saving is available. Triple lame. For more, check out the full release notes below:

Microsoft Office Mobile is the official Office companion optimized for your iPhone. You can access, view and edit your Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft PowerPoint documents from virtually anywhere. Documents look like the originals, thanks to support for charts, animations, SmartArt graphics and shapes. When you make quick edits or add comments to a document, the formatting and content remain intact.

If you want the latest news about updates and improvements to Google services, you won’t find a much better source than Vic Gundotra. As Senior VP of Engineering for Google, he’s privy to pretty much everything that happens at the company. And he likes to share.

So, when he touts a new update for Google+, we listen. In fact, that’s just what he did this morning. According to his post, the update introduces a new navigation drawer that is “more consistent with other Google apps.” In addition, notifications will now sync across devices so you no longer have to see the same notifications from device to device if you’ve already dismissed them.

You also get a new notifications tray with a bell icon that lets you know if there’s something for you to see as well as unread and read trays. So, some nice improvements. This update should start being availbe today for Android and the web with iOS update to follow.

Even though Google is pretty much the king of maps and traffic avoidance these days, it would seem the company wants to do it even better. So, with that in mind, today Google announced they are buying Waze, the GPS social traffic app that updates routes and drive information in real-time as users post updates.

The app has voice navigation, shows community-contributed road alerts, learns from your frequently traveled routes, and can even find the cheapest gas station near you, all based on community interaction with other users. With over 10 million downloads via the Google Play store and at least as many in iTunes, Waze has quite a large user base. With this, Google is hoping to further improve the ability for its Maps app to help drivers avoid those pesky long commute times.

According to the company, they are “excited” about the prospect of “enhancing Google Maps with some of the traffic update features” already used by Waze. They are hoping to “outsmart traffic together.”

Let’s hope they can. We, like everyone else in the world, hates traffic.

For most people, the iPad has become their de facto device to watch movies and television programs while on the go. To help facilitate this, services like Netflix and Hulu offer iOS apps to run on the device.

Today, in an effort to enhance that experience further, Hulu updated its app for the iPad. Here’s what the update gives you:

• Easier navigation. Simply tap or swipe as you navigate to find shows and discover great new content.

• Discover Panel. Tap the image of a new show, movie or episode, and we’ll give you a summary and more info instantly.

• Minimized Player. Want to multitask? Keep watching your desired video in a minimized player while you browse.

• New Series Pages. Includes both the most entertaining clip and the most relevant episode at your fingertips.